TravelAbility Insider

The Intersection of Travel and Disability

Jake Steinman

What Exactly Is Sensory-Friendly Shopping?

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Malls and shopping centers are struggling for business. Parents are stressed out trying to maintain some sense of calm in their homes during the pandemic. Together Champions Autism Network, a South Carolina based advocacy group,  created a Sensory-Friendly Shopping Days this August with Tanger Outlets Myrtle Beach. Both local residents and visitors found it refreshing. Read more here

OUR TAKE  Use this ‘pause’ in business to learn more about sensory-friendly events and think of how to integrate simple sensory precautions at all of your events. The basic definition: fewer people and less buzz—loud music and fountains are off, people offering samples, crowded dressing, or bathrooms are all minimized. All of those things can feel like an assault on a child’s system, making shopping with them nearly impossible. 

Start by getting to know some of the local organizations that work with people with disabilities and ask them what they’d like to see. If the event is small and manageable, it should be do-able in the current pandemic. Use this socially distanced, sensory-friendly day of shopping for parents of children with autism as a model in your area.

“Achoo! Will Plexiglass Dividers Make Post- Pandemic Airlines Feel Safe?’

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A mock-up of an interior with 3 seats, the middle turned in the opposite direction. Pretty genius! illustration courtesy Avio Interiors

The New York Post reports on an Italian company, Avio Interiors, that’s already designed the latest in virus-proof comfortable airplane seating. While there are no wheelchairs seats yet, there are some serious upgrades including more space and plastic germ shields. (You have no idea how far a sneeze droplet can travel until you’ve ridden the New York City subway.)

OUR TAKE: If airlines are going to go back to cattle car mode to survive, adding plexiglass seat dividers to their existing protocols and create opposing-facing middle seats may at least one way to mitigate the risk of infection 

What Would TravelAbility Summit look like as NetFlix Series? TravelAbility Week!

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Going all-virtual this year inspired our team to do even more to meet you where you are and help you avoid information overload. (You may even have some fun!). We’re emulating Netflix and calling this second annual gathering “Season 2”. Attendees will have the ability to choose the number of episodes they want to watch—or binge watch it all live November 9 to 13, 2020. (Season 1 was 2019). The themes this year is Advancing Accessibility and episodes will include “How We Did it.” How  DMO’s, hotels, attractions, and airports are advancing accessibility by creating  landing pages on their website with precisely the information people with a wide range of disabilities need.  Other sessions include: Nothing Dirty Here: Products and Services for Pandemic-proofing, Pure Genius! Assistive Technology and more. You can find the agenda, here. And find coverage of the event, on Marketing News.

Of all the virtual events out there, why attend TravelAbility Week? Consumers and their travel expectations are changing 56 million potential travelers have a disability—and 2020 is the year to begin showing them they are important to you. “While the patchwork of closing has paused marketing campaign, we’re using this time to build the informational infrastructure that will be needed by 

If we’re accessible for people who are disabled today, we’ll all be accessible for the 75 million Baby Boomers who will be aging into a disability tomorrow.
 
—Jake Steinman, Founder, TravelAbilitySummit.com

OUR TAKE A generation of Baby Boomers who refuse to accept age as a barrier will create a new category of products, disrupt the transportation industry, and more,” says Steinman. Find the agenda for new TravelAbility week, just posted here.

Meet Parakeet and Learn Dozens of Virtual Conference Hacks in One Day

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THE MEETING FOR VIRTUAL MEETING PLANNERS

New Event Space—the digital one. This virtual one stop shop event will be held on September 10th and 11th. Originally conceived as a dress rehearsal for TravelAbility Week, the goal is to help meeting planners plan smarter and make their events sing. As readers of this newsletter you know, TravelAbility comes at a crucial time. Instead of white- knuckling it through the upcoming months, we’re helping the travel industry prepare to attract 77 million baby boomers who will be aging into a disability over the next decade. In a nutshell, here’s our mission for the event. PARAKEET will: 

  • Reduce confusion by inviting the top platforms and API’s to demo based on unique features
  • Showcase cutting-edge tech that best replicates human engagement.
  • Highlight the most creative ways other organizers have used platforms

Now all you need to do is tell a colleague about us! You can find news about Parakeet (including a downloadable list of the 112 virtual conference platforms we researched and an explanation of the methodology) here.   

One Woman Making Disability History—for Decades

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Judy H wearing a red sweater and smiling and finishing up her TedTalks speech. She is on set
Judith Heumann on set during her Ted Talk (smiling, wearing a red sweater).

No history of the ADA is complete without the mention of trailblazers, particularly Judith Heumann, author of a new book on her lifelong advocacy, a primer on how to get into good trouble. Heumann is also featured in CripCamp, the fearless and funny history of a summer camp for kids with disabilities in the 1970s that led to lifelong friendships and activism. Barack and Michele Obama produced the documentary. Here are a few of our favorite links to her work, including her new book, Netflix documentary, and a terrific Ted Talk and a brand-new profile of her in the New York Times.   See scenes that hit the cutting room floor, just released, here.